Dinner

02/27/2014

This Tuesday I was in a dinner conundrum. My son(Ved) was super sleepy and cranky because he hadn't taken a nap at his daycare - so he had to be entertained. To add to that I only had just some remnants of veggies at home. A couple of carrots, a few pieces of broccoli, 3-4 leaves of chard, some peppers and green beans that were starting to look questionable.

The big question - whats for dinner started to play through my mind. Should I just pick up something on the way home? If I order the pizza now, it will be ready by the time I get there. But a voice in me said I had to rise to this challenge - we hadn't had enough veggies this week and we hadn't earned our pizza.

Doing anything that required me to be in the kitchen for a while was out of the quesion . The answer - Green Curry. This is a basic recipe - its pretty much the recipe on the curry paste jar with minor modifications - nothing fancy but it tastes yumm. . I was so happy with my decision even the next day as I scraped the last bits from my lunch box.

1> Empty the can of coconut milk into a wok or a deep saute pan. Let it heat up a little. Prep your veggies etc in the mean time.

2> Add the green curry paste and the sugar. I like the Thai Kitchen brand paste the best - I've seen it at a bunch of grocery stores - Safeway, Wholefoods. Its vegan and has the best flavor (I personally didn't like the trader joes one much). I keep a bottle in my house always - for days like this. It lasts for a really long time once you refrigerate it.

3> Add the broth or water to it. This is optional. I prefer a slightly thinner curry so you can adjust the liquid level to your taste. Add a couple of dashes of the fish/oyster sauce - yesterday I wanted to eat vegeterian so I left it out. Add green chillies if you want a spicier curry.

4> Add the veggies / meat. The veggies dont' have to be cut very prettily - just biggish chunks work. If using chicken - you have to cut thin slices so it cooks quickly.

5> Put a lid on it and let the veggies cook. Check the veggie that takes the most time to cook to ensure its done (carrot in my case). Add fresh basil at the end - This is definitely recommended but I didn't have any so I skipped it - the curry was still very good.

Serve with steamed white or brown rice.

I know the recipe looks long. But it is literally heat up coconut milk, add paste, sugar and water, add veggies and let it boil. You could use frozen veggies and the prep time of cutting also goes away ! I also take some out for Ved, and then add green chillies for Vinay and me. Green curry has to have a kick to it :). I used the pressure to make rice, and I had brown rice in 12 minutes!

02/24/2014

This is my attempt to replicate one of my mom's recipes and adapt it for the slow cooker. Its a dark roasted thick curry that takes hours to make on the stove - where you roast the masala slowly and keep stirring to prevent burning. I took the recipe from my mom years ago - but each time I tried it, I lost my patience and moved to the next step a little too quickly and never get the depth of flavor she did.

A little story about the curry - A few years earlier my mom visited me and cooked a storm for us when she was here. Unknown to me, she had frozen some of the food. A couple of weeks after she left - I found a box sweetly labeled "Chicken Curry". I was thrilled, I heated it up and served it for dinner. Vinay took one bite and said - "Wow, this is great. You finally learnt how to cook as well as your mom". Aah - if only I could :). I called my mom and told her and it was a story she loved. She took great pride in her cooking and this reinforced it.

In my version of this recipe, I let the slow cooker do the hard work for me on this and while this chicken curry recipe isn't quite as good as my mom's but its a little closer than I was before.

Prep time - 10-15 mins. Cook time in slow cooker (4 hours)

Ingredients -

* Onions - 1 large or 2 small

* Garlic - 4-5 cloves

* Fresh ginger - 1 inch piece

* Tomato paste - 4-5 tbsp (You can use 1 fresh tomato and grind it, but the color and texture is better with tomato paste)

* Chicken curry masala (any brand you get from the Indian store - I used Shan) - 3 tsp

* Turmeric (Haldi) - 1/2 tsp

* Red chilli powder (Lal-mirch) - 1/2 tsp

* Salt - 2 tsp

* Mustard seeds (Rai) or Cumin seeds (Jeera) for spluttering- 1/2 tsp

* Oil - 1 tbsp

* Chicken leg pieces - 2 lb (6-7 pieces)

* Bay leaf (fresh or dried) (optional) - 2-3 pieces

* Heeng (optional) - 1 pinch (It is supposed to help with digestion)

Method -

1> If your slow cooker has a brown/saute setting - set it up. Add the oil and wait for it to get hot. Add the pinch of heeng and splutter in the Cumin or Mustard seeds. If your slow cooker doesn't have this setting, do this in a saute pan on the stove.

2> Grind the onions, ginger and garlic to a smooth paste. Add just a little water so it can be ground to a smooth paste. Put in the hot oil. Let it brown slightly. Add the bay leaf.

3> Change the setting of the cooker to slow cooking (on high - if you have high/low settings on your cooker). Let the onions cook till you prep the tomatoes. If you did this step in a saute pan - transfer the contents to the slow cooker now.

4> Add the fresh or canned tomato paste. Mix it well with the onions in the cooker.

5> In a bowl, put 1/2 a cup of water. Add all the Masalas (haldi, salt, chili, chicken curry masala). Dissolve to make a thick paste. Add this paste to the cooker. Mix all of this well.

6> Prep the chicken - remove the skin & cut in pieces (if using boneless or full chicken). I find that chicken breast gets stringy with slow cooking - so my preference is leg pieces or thigh meat. Add the chicken pieces to the cooker. Mix well.

7> Add water to the mixture (upto 1 cup). Use your judgement, it should be a thick curry consistency - so it will depend on how much water you put when grinding the onions and the tomato paste used. Chicken gives out water when cooking so too much water will make a thin curry.

8> Close the cooker and forget about it! If you need the food sooner than 4 hours - let it slow cook for as much time as you have. If the chicken is not fully cooked when you check on it, pressure cook it for 10 minutes and serve.

Serve hot with rice, roti or bread.

Other notes -

1> Flavors get intensified in the slow cooker. This is the level of spice we enjoy at home. Adjust levels based on your preference. Taste for salt before serving. If you find the dish too spicy or too salty, stir is some yogurt, sour cream or whipping cream to make it milder.

2> If you are making this on a weekday - do steps 1 and 2 the night before. Put the onion in the slow cooker bowl. Continue with steps 3-5 and add the tomato and masala to the bowl. Cover the slow cooker bowl and refrigerate it. Keep the chicken cleaned and cut in a separate box in the fridge. In the morning, put the bowl in the slow cooker, add water to make it a thick curry and turn it on. Add the raw chicken to the bowl and mix well. Set the slow cooker for 4 hours and leave! Most of the new slow cookers will transition to the WARM setting after the cooking time is over.

Do try out this recipe and let me know how it turned out. I would love to hear from you.

It is a little dramatic to say that this gadget has changed my life - but it has definitely brought a lot of enthusiasm back into my cooking. I do a lot of the prep for dinner the night before or on the weekend. On the day I need to make dinner, I put it all together, set the delay timer and head off to work. By the time I get home I have an incredible hot dinner.

I'm new to slow cooking - I'm still working out recipes that work well in this cooker. My favorite so far is kheema mutter (minced meat with peas). I've tried some stews that have turned out well too. The browning feature is awesome since you can do all the prep in this single pot.

I've used pressure cookers since I learnt how to cook (its a standard feature in most Indian homes) - the kind you put on the stove. This one feels much safer, there is no chance of random splattering due too much water and the delay timer helps a lot.

This is a gadget that I think works very well for Indian cooking. There are other similar gadgets out there, so choose what works for you. What sold me on this one was the stainless steel insert. Its a breeze to clean and stainless steel is a lot healthier to cook in than non-stick coated bowls.

Let me know if you've used it and what you think of it or if there are other options that work just as well or better.

Hey there !

Hi, I am an Indian (Asian) living in California. Interior decoration is my passion. I enjoy cooking, entertaining and my latest hobby is sewing. This blog is about the various projects I work on to keep me creatively challenged and my quest to have an organized beautiful home. I hope you enjoy the Indian twist (and vibrance) that gets added to everything I do. I'd love to hear from you, so feel free to leave a comment.
- Anuja